


Wait by the River

by CitrineGator



Category: HLVRAI - Fandom, Half Life VR But The AI Is Self Aware
Genre: Apologies, Discussion of Death, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gordon and Benrey were friends as kids, Hurt, M/M, Mutual Pining, Not A Game AU, Pining, Post-Canon, Sprinkle of humor, another benrey regen fic!, because. benrey Did die, but its okay he came back, but these dummies don't know it yet, dismissal attitude of own trauma, honestly not as sad as tags make it out to be, i WILL make these two sincere, inspired by a song, s pretty mild on both ends tho, soft, these dudes jus gotta dig thru som feelings, this going to punch u in da gut a little then kiss u goodnight
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-20
Updated: 2021-02-20
Packaged: 2021-03-16 15:40:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,055
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29578329
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CitrineGator/pseuds/CitrineGator
Summary: Benrey's been dead for five months and he's not really sure how to feel about being alive again just yet. Then Gordon comes along and they're both forced to confront the things they've done and their feelings toward eachother.Baby, I didn't mean the things I said. I don't honestly wish you were dead. I'm a fool; I'm just a man. If I only could hold you again.
Relationships: Benrey & Gordon Freeman
Comments: 10
Kudos: 29





	Wait by the River

**Author's Note:**

> do u all ever hear a song that is SO frenrey that u write 5,000 plus words about it? yeah. i had my frenrey playlist on shuffle and Wait by the River by Lord Huron came on and i had vivid thoughts abt Why i added it into my playlist da first place so. yall get dis now!!  
> I'm actually really happy w it so! smile. yall might get another chapter at some point down the line when i maybe have motivation again. no guarantees but! this would mostly be a hurt/comfort fic (lying more on the comfort side if ima be honest.) fr, no guarantee doe.

Benrey was fairly sure there wasn't a life after death. Well, not for him at least. He could never really die; there would always be the empty expanse of the void waiting for him, repairing him piece by piece till he was as good as new again. It wasn't any fun since it was just an empty space devoid of anything, but for a majority of the time, he didn't even get to experience it because his body was too busy recovering to waste time on silly things like _cognition_. It was mostly okay though because it was easier to let your subconscious put together a body instead of trying to figure out where everything went by eyeballing it. And when he _did_ wake back up, he realized there was still a lot to fix before he could respawn again, so it gave him a lot of time to think things over. 

He'd only had to completely build himself up from nothing once before, and that was when he'd come to Earth for the very first time. Of course, he'd looked a lot different back then, an owl-eyed fuzzball with a giant maw full of sharp teeth. He was in a much simpler shape then, and he didn't have a lot of memories to retain, so it took a shorter period of time to build himself back up. It hadn't hurt so much to be utterly destroyed then either. 

Because, as it turned out, Gordon probably _hadn't_ remembered him like he'd first assumed. His first few weeks on Earth were spent scrabbling around the underbrush and eating anything he could get his claws on. And then he'd accidentally bitten a stray finger and had been promptly launched into the air with a yelp from both parties to land in a curly brown nest of hair. 

A smile flashed over Benrey's features as he remembered Gordon lurching upright and running around wildly in an attempt to dislodge him, inadvertently only making him grip on all the tighter. When Gordon had eventually got the strange alien off his head, he'd been a moment from bolting, but a stray look over his shoulder had given him pause. A fuzzy, black-furred version of Benrey with wide eyes stared curiously back at the young person. 

Despite their strained meeting, they were fast friends; Gordon carried Benrey around on his shoulder and let him hop off whenever to grab a leaf or a furious squirrel to bring back. Benrey would chirp out tiny sweet voice bubbles at his friend, and Gordon would offer him small pieces of his sandwich in return. He even let Benrey ride around in his sweatshirt hood once. He'd curled up there like a little cat, his hands tangled up in Gordon's stray braid that'd whisked back in his direction. 

He never knew why Gordon had to leave, but he supposed he never would now that Gordon had killed him. But it was hard to realize the person he'd considered his first-ever friend had completely forgotten him. Even worse, it was hard to hear that he thought they'd never been friends at all. He wished Gordon remembered. 

Maybe then he would have had the time to tell everybody he'd already gone ahead and killed the big baby looking thing. Possibly then, everyone could have turned back, and they could have all gone home like they were supposed to. But _no_ , Gordon had to ignore him and go tromping all into Xen and getting scared over him being all big and cool from the energy Xen was pouring into him. 

He'd messed up with the hand thing though, that Benrey could say for sure. The military was just supposed to rough Gordon up, maybe give him a black eye, and Benrey could nag him for being a dumb little guy- not being able to see in the dark like his cool best friend, and he could kiss it better with a little sweet voice. 

Taking his _hand_ though, was a step too far, and now there was more bootboy blood spattered over the halls of Black Mesa to clean. Not that Benrey minded; they had it coming in the first place. But Benrey didn't get why Gordon was still mad at him after he got the gun arm. Sure, he and Bubby were at fault for getting it taken off in the first place, and he'd said some brain-to-mouth bullshit in the middle of a panic, but he'd forgiven Bubby when they all met up again! Benrey didn't get why Gordon couldn't forgive him. Especially because it was going to change back into a flesh arm afterward. Stupid dumb baby couldn't even tell he had a flesh arm growing in there. The potion guy had even _said_ he was firing fingernails. 

But Gordon and everyone else had still killed him. And since it took such a fuck-ton of time to regen, he got to think everything over and eventually decided he wasn't really all that mad about it anymore. Sure, it'd been major sucks that they'd shot him and stuff, but he always came back, so it was mostly fine. Throwing a big temper tantrum over not being friends with someone anymore wasn't very cool or gamer like so he kinda' deserved it for being cringe. Didn't mean it hadn't hurt though. Taking everybody's passports was dumb, and tying his life force to them was even more so. 

But it'd got the Science Team out of Xen, so he was glad for that at the very least. Even if it still hurt to remember the victorious look on Gordon's face after killing him. He was never really going to hurt anybody, but he'd put on a good enough show to make it seem like he was. He'd been mad, but he wasn't nearly angry enough to kill the only people he'd ever cared about. That would definitely be a noob move; friendly fire was bad. Even if the rest of the Science Team didn't see him as a friendly. 

He let out a tired huff as an approaching car behind him lit up the water of the neighborhood pond he'd respawned next to. It was one of the small shitty ones that only went five feet deep with a long-broken fountain in the middle. _And_ it had no fish. Not that he'd gone in to check. Stupid pond, stupid wet clothes that were making him cold, stupid respawn dropping him in the middle of an unfamiliar neighborhood- 

The passing car screeched to a halt just off to his right, making Benrey's head jerk upright. He squinted at the bright red taillights, blinking cheerily at him and making his eyes hurt until they flashed off. People shouldn't stop in the middle of the road; it was the middle of the night, and they could probably get hit by another car. Stupid rule breaker. Maybe Bubby would like whoever it was then; Bubby enjoyed breaking traffic laws. Then again, he probably didn't enforce rules anymore, seeing as Black Mesa was destroyed, so he wasn't a security guard either. 

Benrey was just about to move back to looking out at the still pond when the driver's side door kicked open. 

. . . 

Gordon had been doing a lot better as of late. He finally got a steady job again, even if he didn't really need it with the hush money he had coming in from Black Mesa still, but it was nice to have something extra to do with his time. Joshua had been coming over for weekend visits for nearly two months now, and his spring break was coming up soon, and he'd be spending it with Gordon this time which he was excited for. He was getting better at being open with his new therapist, which was something he'd always struggled with, but the woman was kind enough to be patient with him. And it'd been nearly a month since the last time he'd panicked over something small, but even when he did, there was usually always someone he could call and rely on to help him figure something out to help. 

That wasn't to say he was entirely better, definitely not, but he was getting there, and he was more stable than he had been in a long time. The monthly meetups with the Science Team were a big help too. They usually all met up more than once a month, but they made sure to dedicate a day every month to where everyone would have to be present in the same room. Not only did it help to talk through the trauma that they all survived and get reminded that they weren't alone in it, Gordon realized he did genuinely enjoy everyone else's presence. Because as it turned out, when you weren't in a high-stress environment of killing aliens, soldiers and scientists, their jokes were a bit easier to process. 

Given, a lot of the Science Team's jokes had been at very inopportune moments that Gordon had taken as serious at the time, but they'd all since apologized and gotten over that. And he'd been able to get to really know everyone else, which was nice too. Surviving the apocalypse did tend to bring people together after all. 

Bubby and Coomer had moved into a house together, and Gordon had a hunch it wasn't just because Bubby had nowhere else to go having been born in Black Mesa. But he wouldn't ever express that suspicion to anyone else but Tommy unless he wanted his ribs broken or his curtains lit on fire. 

Tommy had found an apartment to live in, not too far from Gordon's house, so they got together a bit for hangouts. Gordon wasn't anywhere near as good at fighting games as Tommy, but he was getting better from the competition. And surprisingly, Darnold lived nearby too, the same apartment building as Tommy. Gordon didn't see him as often, but he heard back on him from Tommy every once in a while. And he was happy to see the lively look on the more senior scientist's face talking about the mixologist, an expression Tommy purposefully denied every time he brought it up. 

But he still needed to get away every once in a while; everyone did. Bubby burned things, Coomer boxed, Tommy went for runs, and Gordon drove. He was reasonably sure he was lost in some winding middle-class neighborhood, but he had google maps to guide him back home, so he was fine for now. He was rounding a corner when he saw the dark figure perched on the edge of the grass, their head drooped low and perched on one of their knees pulled up to their chest. And Gordon wanted to pay them no mind, to look the other way, but the glint of the helmet in headlights was too familiar for him to feel comfortable. So, against his better judgment, he peered closer as they flashed fully into view, his stomach doing an uncomfortable flip when he _recognized_ the person, well, alien sitting there. 

Stomping his foot down onto the break, hardly caring about how loud it definitely sounded to the people in the surrounding houses, Gordon hastily pulled his keys out and turned his headlights off. It took a moment of him struggling with the seatbelt to remember where it was in his hurry to get out, but as he threw open the door and practically launched himself out of the vehicle, Gordon found Benrey's eyes immediately locked on his own. 

The guard looked just like Gordon remembered, not like how he was on Xen, but like he'd seen for the first time by the outside of the elevator. Albeit a little downtrodden and wet looking like he'd went swimming in the pond beside them both, which he wouldn't doubt, but it was just _Benrey_. 

They were both still for an indeterminable moment before Gordon made the first move, deliberately stalking forward. A deep sense of unease rooted in his heart at the other man's presence, but even more than that was a tiny glimmer of hope. Because he'd missed Benrey despite it all. Five months of nothing, and now he was just _here_? He had a million questions that could wait until he could decipher that look in Benrey's eyes. 

Benrey looked caught between getting prepared to flee and wanting to move closer as well. Instead, he jerkily worked his way to his feet, making Gordon freeze in his advance. He- he had _missed_ Benrey, despite all the jabs at him, despite the boss fight that almost seemed halfhearted, despite having lost his arm to the guy, Gordon missed him. The Science Team was fun, he would never complain about the closeness they'd all achieved, but it wasn't the same without Benrey. In the quiet space after a bout of laughter that Gordon silently wished was filled with a buzz of sweet voice, or in the heat of a nonsensical argument where someone should have said something dumb to diffuse the tension with an abrupt fit of breathless giggles. He _missed_ that in the five months Benrey had been gone, whether he'd realized it or not at the time. 

So, Gordon closed the space between them with another step, wrapping his arms around Benrey's larger chest, distantly wondering if he'd always towered over him. Either way, he dug his face into the rough security vest, hooking his chin over Benrey's shoulder and feeling the guard still in his hold. And- yeah, Benrey definitely had jumped into the pond at some point, but he had a feeling that both of them needed this. It was hardly a half-second later that Benrey crumpled into him as well though, tentatively curling his arms around Gordon's back and pulling him close like he thought he'd break. And maybe he would, a muffled voice said, because a part of him had accepted that Benrey was gone. 

But standing on the side of the road in some Hoa neighborhood wasn't exactly the most preferable place for him to split apart at his edges. Gordon schooled his expression back to something that hopefully wouldn't betray his feelings too badly, but he never had a good poker face, so he doubted that'd be the case. Pulling back from Benrey, he looked up to meet the guard's eyes, offering the softest smile he could muster up, which honestly wasn't that hard. 

"Where have you _been_ man? I-… We missed you." 

Benrey inhaled a sharp breath through his nose, fiddling with the bottom edge of his shirt just poking out from beneath the security vest, "Here. For uh, twenty minutes, maybe. Just got back. Was re-building my sim sona bro. Kinda… Kinda got wrecked last time." 

Gordon tried not to flinch at the wording, biting his lip as he glanced back toward his car, the lights off and his door still open, probably rapidly accumulating frigid air inside, "Do- do you have anywhere _to_ go? I don't… I'm not going to let you sit out here in the cold." 

"Yeah, well, maybe I like the cold, huh? Think about that? I'm tryin' to get the achievement for growing icicles bro." 

Letting out a snort, Gordon waved Benrey toward his car, "You can get the achievement for warming up in a car instead," he only paused as he neared the trunk, glancing back toward Benrey, who was nervously following after him, "You… You're not going to get all… ' _Xenrey_ ' on me or whatever, right?" he asked, using air-quotes, "Like you- you aren't gonna bring up passports or whatever the fuck?" 

Shaking his head, Benrey looked down the street, his eyebrows furrowing under the brim of his helmet, "Nah, that was uh, that wasn't cool of me. Not- not kosher. I'm… M' not gonna get all big again. Prommy." 

Nodding once, Gordon opened his trunk and pulled out a towel, "Just dry off before you sit down." 

Benrey blinked at the towel in his hands once before simply wrapping it around his waist, which… Wasn't really what Gordon had been shooting for, but it was fine enough he supposed. Shooing Benrey around to the passenger side, he slid back into the driver seat, watching Benrey from the edge of his vision as he sidled in next to him. The silence inside felt a hundred times more tense now than it had out in the cold, but it was quickly diffused by Benrey immediately messing with the radio dial when he turned the car on. 

"Dude," he laughed, "Just pick one; you're only getting static at this point." 

"It's my _favorite_ song. You gonna' be mean just as I get back? So rude of you." 

That was enough for Gordon to leave him be to twirl the dial some more. It- he wasn't scared of Benrey anymore, not really, but there was a talk that was going to need to be had in the near future, and Gordon wasn't sure he was prepared for it. Because he _did_ feel bad for being mean to Benrey. He'd shot at the guy, yelled in his face, and flat out threatened him, and that was all _before_ losing his arm. The betrayal definitely hadn't helped the situation any, but seeing as he did have an arm again and he'd had Tommy explain to him a few of the things Benrey did… So, yeah, Gordon felt bad about what he'd done. 

Not bad enough to entirely forgive him, but at least enough to hear him out. Benrey hadn't immediately jumped back to poking fun of him in a stressful situation, so he was keeping his fingers crossed that it wasn't just a ploy of some sort. He wasn't scared of Benrey, not with how nervous he'd looked as Gordon had gotten out of his car, but he was allowed to be wary. 

Luckily, he hadn't driven too far from his house, so it only took a few minutes of driving to the beat of horrible radio static and clips of music before they rolled back into his driveway. 

Benrey unbuckled himself easily enough, so Gordon did the same and hopped out of the car as well, locking it and bounding up the steps to his front door. He could feel the guard's presence over his shoulder, but Gordon tried to ignore it as much as he could, turning his attention to jiggling his lock open. When the door finally decided to show him some mercy, Gordon let it swing open, padding inside and holding onto the edge to watch Benrey come in as well. 

As he steered them both toward the living room for the much-needed chat, Gordon felt the weight in the pit of his stomach growing heavier with every step. He wanted to forgive Benrey; he missed the guy after all, but if he leaped back to denying everything Gordon said... Well, he'd just have to wait to see what Benrey said. 

. . . 

"You got a uh, sweet pad bro," Benrey mumbled, tapping his thumb against the side of his wrist as he looked everywhere but Gordon, "Decked out with chairs and everything." 

Gordon hummed a response back that Benrey couldn't quite decipher between the cottony fuzz between his ears. Because why the _fuck_ was he in Gordon's house. He- he'd taken the guy's arm off! And sure, he could see that it was back now, a tight little ring of pale scar tissue around where the gun had fused to his body, but he'd been the cause of Gordon losing that arm. He was supposed to be _mad_ at him; Benrey was _expecting_ Gordon to be mad at him. But this new... Softer side of Gordon, he hadn't really seen before. There was a careful air about the other man, which he understood, but Gordon wasn't supposed to fucking _hug_ him. This wasn't something he knew how to deal with. 

"-nrey? _Benrey_?" 

Snapping back to attention from where he'd been zoning out, apparently from staring at the little drawings clipped to the fridge with some fun-looking magnets, Benrey looked back to Gordon, feeling just a bit abashed. He didn't want to look like he was trying to ignore him because he- he couldn't fuck this up. He wasn't like Tommy or Gman with time powers. He got one chance to get that redemption arc path, and he couldn't afford any mistakes. 

"Huh? Sorry uh... Yeah, sweet place." 

Gordon's lips pursed a bit, and Benrey wanted to sink a little further into the couch he was still perched on the edge of. Fuck, okay, retry. 

"I wasn't... I need ta' say sorry to you. I didn't mean for the arm thing to happen, but it still did, wasn't cool of me to do, and I wanna say I'm sorry. I was... Was a huge not great to you after that too. An' you don't gotta' forgive me for it. Fucked up to do to a friend. Or uh, pal. Colleague. Whatever. Wasn't cool of me at all, an' I wanna say sorry for it. Don't... Don't want to hurt you. _Didn't_ want to hurt you. But m' sorry I did." 

Benrey could hardly bring himself to not just immediately clip out of the building and go running off so he didn't have to face whatever response Gordon was going to give him. He was half prepared for more bullets despite there not being a gun in sight and half prepared to be told to just get out, but Benrey would take whatever it was. He would deserve it either way. So he clutched the edge of the towel he'd wrapped around himself and steeled himself for whatever was coming. 

"Do you mean that?" 

His head whipped up into a nod so fast, Benrey was pretty sure that he cracked some neck bone in his fucked up human adjacent body, "Yeah. Wouldn't- can't lie bout apology shit. Also fucked up to do. Zero out of ten, nobody liked that." 

Gordon cracked a small smile at him, a weary look crossing his features as he slowly looked down to his hands folded in his lap, "I'm not going to say that all wasn't... A lot," he started hesitantly, "Getting my arm cut off was fucked, and it kinda' messed me up for a while. Sometimes it feels like it's not even there again, and it _hurts_ \- but that's a whole other thing. The boss battle wasn't great for my mental health either, but... I think I understand, at least a little bit. Or if I don't, I- I _want_ to understand. Because I want to forgive you Benrey an- and it might take me some time but... I do want to forgive you." 

Something in Benrey's chest fluttered with joy and relief at the words, coming free past his lips in a jet of pink, orange, and minty green that left a pleasant aftertaste in his mouth. Because- maybe not _now_ \- but Gordon wanted to forgive him. Gordon didn't hate him, which solved a surprising amount of his qualms about being alive again. Of course, he still needed to check in with the rest of the Science Team, apologize to them, and somehow wriggle his way back into the group if they'd let him. But if Gordon; the one out of the Science Team who'd arguably wanted him dead the _most_ , wasn't upset over him being back, Benrey didn't think they'd push him away for too long. Or at least he hoped so. 

Benrey honed back in onto the situation at hand, watching Gordon's expression go soft at the sweet voice still hovering in the air. And reaching his hand out- the scarred one Benrey's hind-brain noted, he let one come to rest in his palm. It was just a pink little ball full of mist, so it didn't take much to be destroyed, but Gordon was cradling it in his hand like something precious. And that made Benrey absolutely woozy with another rush of unfamiliar feelings, something he could decipher later. But for now, it just came out as some blush pink sweet voice, replenishing the colored lights in the semi-darkened room. Eventually though, Gordon looked back to him, that soft look still present on his face, the one that was positively turning Benrey's knees to mush despite still sitting down. 

"You don't have anywhere else to go, right?" 

Benrey bobbed his head in confirmation. 

"You could uh, you could stay here if you wanted?" Gordon said, tilting his head to the side just enough that a lock of his hair tumbled down over his shoulder, "Just- just for the night, but... I've got a guest bedroom upstairs if you're alright with staying." 

He much too soon after Gordon finished speaking to not be suspicious, though Benrey figured it didn't matter much anyway with how giddy he felt following Gordon up the stairs. Another belt of warm sweet voice was building in his throat, but he opted to swallow it down instead of spilling his feelings into the open air for everyone to see again. Not that it really mattered if Gordon wasn't able to read them, but it was about the principle of a thing. He did let his lips quirk up a bit at the cozy glow in his chest that only strengthened when he stared back up at Gordon. 

. . . 

Opening the door to the guest bedroom, Gordon flicked on the light next on the inside wall, illuminating the strange interior. Initially, it'd been just a boring, neutral-colored guest bedroom that hardly served a purpose aside from extra storage when he was rearranging things around the house. But ever since Tommy had stayed over once, he'd begun the tradition of leaving a stray decoration in there to liven it up. 

And Gordon had originally wanted to protest it because what if someone else saw the poster of 'Bubby is best' hung on the wall with paw-printed ducktape, or the large jpeg of a beyblade that Tommy had slid under the lip of the lamp so when it lit up the image was visible too? He quickly concluded though, that there probably _wouldn't_ be anyone else who would stay in that room. He hadn't spoken to his family in a few years now, and he didn't have any lasting friendships from college, so it'd just be the Science Team's room for when they stayed over. 

Only from a second perspective now did he realize how disorganized the room appeared, but from the glint of happy recognition that he caught in Benrey's eyes, he figured the guard didn't mind too much. 

"There should be some pajamas in the nightstand drawer if you want them. I don't know if they'll fit since you're uh... You're pretty tall," Instead of dwelling on the height difference that he somehow hadn't noticed in Black Mesa, Gordon gestured at the towel, "I can take that too for you if ya' want." 

Benrey unwrapped it from around his waist and handed it over, carefully padding further into the room, his boots hardly making a sound on the carpet. As he set to investigating the momento's the Science Team had left, Gordon worried at the frayed edge of the towel. 

"I'm sorry too." 

Benrey cast an abrupt look over his shoulder, eyes going wide as he straightened a bit, "Wuh?" 

Trying to still the jitteriness in his guts, Gordon kept his eyes on Benrey, "I wasn't- I wasn't very nice to you either. I shot at you and was rude all the time, and I _killed_ you. So I'm... I'm sorry." 

Blinking incredulously at him, Benrey padded back across the floor to stand opposite of him, "Dude, I wasn't being very swag either I uh, kinda' deserved it." 

"You _didn't_ though! You kind of were just doing your job, and I threatened and shot at you man. You didn't deserve that." 

"I cut off your _arm_ ," Benrey said gruffly as if it was proving any point, "Kinda' fair of you." 

"I got it back though! I came out of there relatively unharmed, and you were dead for five months because of us! I don't... I'm sorry for having to kill you." 

Benrey was quiet for a long moment before he settled one hand on Gordon's cheek like he'd done to the rest of the Science Team in Black Mesa, "M' not mad about it. Went through the uh—five stages of griefing or whatever already. Figured _you_ were gonna be mad, maybe hop back in your car and run me over or something. Not... Not let me _stay_ here. Bro moments. We're good. Well- we're uh not at that hundred percent completion route yet. But I'm not mad, you're not mad, nobody gotta' be stressed about it." 

Letting out a dry laugh, Gordon amusedly batted Benrey's hand away, "I don't think I can just _not_ be stressed about it, but... I'm glad you're not harboring any sort of malicious anger at me or whatever," Tucking the towel under one arm, Gordon clapped Benrey on the shoulder as he turned to leave, "I'll be in the room just down the hall, and the bathroom light's always on. Night Benrey." 

He heard the sound of the door closing behind him, but just before it clicked shut, Gordon heard a quiet, "Night Feetman." 

By the time he whirled around to glare at Benrey, the door was shut, and the light was off too. Letting out an entertained snort, Gordon shook his head, tossing his towel into the laundry basket in the bathroom before heading into his room to go to sleep too. 

They could talk about what to do about Benrey being back in the morning, but for now, all Gordon was going to do was flop down onto his mattress and pass the fuck out. So, changing out of his clothes and slipping on a pair of his own pajamas, he crawled into bed and let himself drift off to the absurd idea that he was sleeping under the same roof as _Benrey_ again. Which... Was more of a comforting thought that Gordon would have assumed before. But he wasn't one to look a gift horse in the mouth, so he snuggled further into the warmth of his blankets and let himself fall into a dreamless sleep.

**Author's Note:**

> my sibling beta-ed this for me like. an hour ago and he said it was good to go so im jumping to post it lol so shoutouts to them, but ifv u do see any errors feel free to let me know.  
> and maybe one day i will let guests comment... but im fr terrified of negative reviews so I’m sorry to yall ifv u wanted to say sum nice lol.


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